Sprouting Soul Botanicals

09/22/2025

09/22/2025

🌿 Herb of the Week: Shiitake Mushroom (Lentinula edodes)

Best known as a beloved culinary mushroom, Shiitake also carries a long history of use as medicine. In East Asian traditions, it has been valued not only for its savory, umami-rich flavor, but also for its ability to strengthen vitality and support overall wellness.

Shiitake contains unique polysaccharides such as lentinan, which have been studied for their immune-modulating and anti-inflammatory effects. It’s often turned to for balancing cholesterol, supporting circulation, and strengthening the body’s defenses as the seasons change.

Beyond its medicinal benefits, Shiitake is a perfect example of food as medicine—nourishing, versatile, and deeply supportive to health when included regularly in the diet. Whether enjoyed in soups, broths, stir-fries, or teas, this mushroom offers both flavor and function.

Shiitake reminds us that the everyday foods we eat can also be powerful allies for long-term vitality. 🍄

👉 Do you enjoy Shiitake in your cooking?

09/21/2025

🍄 Honey Mushrooms (Armillaria spp.)

A true autumn mushroom — appearing in golden-brown clusters at the base of dead or dying trees as the season turns. Beloved for their firm texture and earthy flavor, honey mushrooms are a rewarding find — but also one that requires more experience compared to unmistakeable, novice-friendly wild treats.

Identification notes:

• Found in dense clusters on stumps, roots, or buried wood
• Honey to tawny caps, sometimes darker in the center, often with fine hairs or scales
• White gills, sometimes running slightly down the stem
• A thin ring or “skirt” may be present
• White spore print — the single most important feature distinguishing them from poisonous look-alikes like deadly Galerina (Galerina marginata), which has a rusty-brown spore print

Both young “button” honeys and mature caps are delicious when thoroughly cooked. The buttons, with their crisp snap, are the favorite — excellent for pickling, roasting, and adding to soups and stews. Larger caps can be enjoyed roasted or cooked down, but it’s the tender buttons that foragers prize most.

⚠️ Forager’s note: Honeys are considered a more advanced mushroom to forage. Misidentification with deadly species has happened, so confirm every feature — especially the spore print — and learn them alongside experienced foragers.

Fun fact: The largest living organism in the entire world is a honey fungus! Inhabiting Oregon’s Malheur National Forest, this massive underground mycelial network is one single organism that has been alive for millennia — spanning nearly 4 square miles of forest.

When in season, these parasitic mushrooms can appear in massive abundance — a gift of the fall forest for those with patience, practice, and respect for the fungi.

09/20/2025

🍄 Deadly Galerina (Galerina marginata)

One of the “little brown mushrooms” (often called LBMs) of our forests, deadly galerina is as delicate and beautiful as it is important to know.

ID features to know:

• Tawny-brown cap, often bell-shaped when young, later flattening with age
• Thin, brittle stem with a faint ring zone
• Rusty brown spore print
• Grows on decaying wood, often in clusters

Sometimes called the “funeral bell,” this humble mushroom carries a name that reflects both its bell-shaped cap and the seriousness of its chemistry. It contains the same potent compounds as the infamous death cap — a reminder of how much power can be held in something so unassuming.

This is one of my favorite mushroom photos I’ve taken — proof that even species we must treat with caution can also be strikingly beautiful in their own right.

09/19/2025

Ease into evening, naturally. 🌿
This calming blend supports the nervous system, softens stress, and prepares the body for restorative sleep. With passionflower to soothe and oatstraw to restore, Rest & Relax guides you into the stillness your body has been asking for.

A nourishing cup for peaceful evenings and steady rest.

✨ Available through our online shop:
🌐 www.sproutingsoulbotanicals.com

09/16/2025

🍄 Fall Foraging Favorites — Beginner Mushrooms of the Northeast 🍂

September brings some of the best and most beginner-friendly mushrooms to our forests. Here are a few worth keeping an eye out for:

✨ Chanterelles — golden, apricot-scented, with soft ridges instead of true gills.
🌑 Black Trumpets — dark, hollow trumpets hidden in moss and leaf litter.
🔥 Chicken of the Woods — bright orange shelves sprouting from hardwoods, tender when young.
🌿 Hen of the Woods (Maitake) — big, frilly clusters growing at the base of hardwoods (especially oak).
⚪️ Puffballs — round, white mushrooms (safe only when pure white inside).
🦁 Lion’s Mane — snowy white “icicles” that grow like pom-poms on hardwoods.

⚠️ Always double-check your finds with multiple ID features and a reliable field guide. When in doubt, leave it out — and steer clear of “little brown mushrooms” and Amanitas until you’re much more advanced.

🍂 Fall in the Northeast is a season of abundance — happy foraging! 🌿

09/15/2025

🌿 Herb of the Week: Lemongrass (Cymbopogon citratus)

With its bright citrus aroma and smooth, lemony flavor, lemongrass is as refreshing as it is therapeutic. Long cherished in both food and tea traditions, it offers a calming lift that refreshes body and mind.

Traditionally, lemongrass has been used to ease digestion, soothe tension, and support the body’s natural detoxification. It is thought to gently encourage circulation and bring relief in times of restlessness or discomfort. Its uplifting nature makes it a favorite for reducing stress while offering clarity and focus.

As a tea, lemongrass is cooling yet comforting—an herbal ally for unwinding at the end of the day. You’ll find it featured in our Rest & Relax blend, where it pairs with other calming herbs to create a soothing cup for quiet moments of restoration. 🌿

09/12/2025

Find relief when you need it most. 🌿
This soothing blend draws on marshmallow, licorice, and wild cherry bark—alongside other supportive herbs—long valued for coating, protecting, and easing irritated tissues.

With a smooth lemon-berry profile and comforting herbal depth, it’s a gentle cup for throat and sinus relief when irritation or inflammation strike.

✨ Available through our online shop:
🌐 www.sproutingsoulbotanicals.com

09/11/2025

🍄 Wild Mushroom Spotlight: Turkey Tail (Trametes versicolor)

One of the most common fungi in our forests, turkey tails fan out in layered shelves across fallen logs and stumps. Their thin, leathery caps show beautiful, banded colors — browns, blues, greens, and rusts — that look just like a wild turkey’s tail feathers.

ID tip: True turkey tails always have a white pore surface underneath (not gills). Their lookalikes, like false turkey tail (Stereum), lack pores — an easy way to tell them apart.

✨ Long valued as an immune-supportive mushroom, turkey tail is commonly prepared as a tea or tincture to extract its beneficial compounds. Beyond its herbal uses, it also plays an important ecological role — breaking down wood, recycling nutrients, and keeping the forest alive.

Next time you’re walking in the woods, keep an eye on fallen logs and stumps — you might find a little “forest fanfare” of turkey tails at work.

09/09/2025

🍂 Fall Seasonal Blend — Ashwagandha Chai 🍂

A red rooibos chai with ashwagandha, vana tulsi, and warming spices—a cozy cup to wrap you in the calm comfort of fall.

This grounding, caffeine-free blend is crafted to ease stress, support balance, and bring warmth to crisp autumn evenings. The gentle adaptogens pair with soothing spices to create a cup that feels restorative, cozy, and deeply seasonal. 🍵🍁

Explore this blend and more at 🌿 www.sproutingsoulbotanicals.com

09/08/2025

🌿 Herb of the Week: Muira Puama (Ptychopetalum olacoides)

Sometimes called “potency wood,” Muira Puama is a small Amazonian tree whose bark and roots have been valued in traditional Brazilian herbalism for centuries. Known as a general tonic, it has been used to strengthen the body in times of fatigue, uplift mood, and support memory and focus.

While Ptychopetalum olacoides is the most widely recognized source of Muira Puama, another species—Croton echioides—has also been used under the same name in certain regions.

Beyond its reputation as a nervine and adaptogen-like ally for the nervous system, Muira Puama is also known historically for its role in supporting circulation and sexual health. In modern times, some interest has focused on its potential cognitive and stress-relieving effects, though research is still limited compared to its long traditional use.

While less familiar in Western herbalism, Muira Puama stands out as a fascinating plant ally—one that highlights both the depth of Amazonian tradition and the ongoing importance of learning from global herbal wisdom. 🌿✨

09/07/2025

🍄 September is National Mushroom Month! 🍄

Mushrooms are more than just a tasty addition to the plate — they’re ecological powerhouses. Across the globe, fungi play a critical role as decomposers, recyclers, and even healers, transforming forest debris into fertile soil and forming symbiotic partnerships with trees and plants.

🌿 Fun Fact: Many mushrooms are part of the “Wood Wide Web” — vast underground networks of fungal threads (mycelium) that connect trees and plants, allowing them to share nutrients and even send chemical signals to one another. It’s one of nature’s most fascinating examples of communication and cooperation.

Whether you’re admiring chanterelles, turkey tails, or the intricate Hericium species, National Mushroom Month is the perfect time to pause and appreciate the fungal world that sustains our ecosystems — and inspires herbalists, foragers, and food lovers alike.